


winter came. winter fell.

by sanssstark



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Gen, Post-Episode: s08e03 The Long Night, Season/Series 08, Sibling Bonding, Winterfell, episode coda
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-30
Updated: 2019-04-30
Packaged: 2020-02-10 10:03:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,798
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18658210
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sanssstark/pseuds/sanssstark
Summary: winter came and winter fell at winterfell.





	winter came. winter fell.

**Author's Note:**

> the ep was lowkey disappointing once the adrenaline wore off but thank the gods my children survived. since i have 0 faith that d&d will get into the emotional weight behind winning the war next ep, i wrote this. there will be a part 2.

Incredibly, they had not died.

Sansa sinks to her knees the moment the wights all fall, disintegrating into heaps of bones and cloth, and her stomach sinks, rebels, and she pukes. It is over, all over, and Sansa had survived along with less of those in the crypt than they had thought, but more than she had thought when the dead came – their dead, the Stark dead, oh Gods, the wights around her came from the crypt, the graves, not from outside.

Sansa looks back at the survivors. Tyrion is watching her, a grim expression on his face, and Varys holds two of the children. Gilly is watching Sansa as well, and as their gazes meet Sam’s kind wife tries for a smile that looks almost painful.

“We wait until the men come,” Sansa orders. She thinks it is all over, but they shall not risk it. There are a few scattered nods and some, few smiles and Sansa watches as mothers hold their children, some weeping and some staring ahead at their dead with blank eyes.

Apropos. Sansa gets up from her knees, wincing at the sight of her own sick and steps up to one of the poor women who had not been able to get away from the wights swiftly enough. “May you rest in the arms of the Stranger, who formed you from the dust of the earth. May the Mother, the Father and all the Gods welcome you now that you have gone forth from this life,” she whispers. The woman stares up at the ceiling, unseeing eyes, and Sansa takes the dagger Arya had given her and drives it through the temple of the woman.

There is a gasp somewhere behind her.

Sansa moves along to the next corpse, a babe this time and her stomach rolls again. “May you rest in the arms of the Stranger, who formed you from the dust of the earth. May the Mother, the Father and all the Gods welcome you now that you have gone forth from this life,” she says, as she drives the dagger through the temple of the babe.

They must not return. Even if it seems as though the Night King has been defeated, Sansa refuses to take the chance. Best would be to burn all their dead, but she refuses to burn the dead in the crypt. The crypt is for the Starks, and for Starks to rest alone.

“My lady,” Tyrion says, stepping up to her. They are of one height now, with Sansa on her knees and she is suddenly reminded of the moment of their wedding. “I am sure that can –”

“No,” Sansa says, sharply. “It can’t wait.”

“Surely there is someone else who can,” Tyrion begins, stopping as she glares at him.

“There are my people,” Sansa hisses at them, hoping that the other women in the crypt cannot overhear. “We told them the crypt was safe. It was not. It was all but that.”

She walks over to the heap of bones that collapsed just beyond her Uncle Brandon’s grave and she reaches down. The cloth pooling around him is dark and a little drab and Sansa wonders who had decided to bury the man in it. From all the few stories Father had once told about his childhood, Uncle Brandon had been neither dark nor drab.

None of them had ever thought it possible that her dead ancestors could be resurrected by the Night King. Jon had once said, only recent corpses could be turned to wights, but that theory had just been thoroughly disproven.

Sansa looks away from her uncle. Tyrion is kneeling beside another corpse, whispering words that Sansa cannot hear and then he drives a piece of obsidian – Sansa does not know where he got it, because her own dagger is still in her hands – through the skull of the woman.

Sansa sighs and approaches the next body when there is loud knocking on the crypt doors. A few of the women scream, holding their children tighter again and Sansa too tries to calm her rapidly thundering heart. She climbs the stairs up, and knocks back, three times, before calling out, “Who is it?”

“Lady Sansa, it is Brienne. Open the door. The war has been won.”

The words send a thrill of relief through Sansa and she quickly unbolts the door. Daenerys’ girl Missandei is quickly by her side to help and together they lift the few fortifications out of the way, before opening the door.

Brienne looks wild. She is drenched in blood and grime, but she seems hale and healthy as her face melt in relief as she spots Sansa and most of the survivors on the door behind them. “Lady Sansa,” she breathes. “The war has been won.”

Sansa’s voice shakes as she responds, “Thank the Gods.”

Missandei pushes past them, disappearing off into Winterfell and as Sansa follows her, she registers the destructions wreaked on Winterfell.

Dead pile the courtyard and she can only see a few men standing. Gods above. How many had they lost? By this sight alone, it must have been a considerable number of their forces. “How are-“

“I do not know, my lady,” Brienne says as Sansa cannot continue to speak. Beside them the survivors spill out into the yard with cries and wails of despair as they see the mayhem. “I came right here. Are you safe?”

Sansa swallows. “The Stark dead rose.”

Brienne curses, then blushes at the reaction. “I apologize, my lady.”

Sansa waves away the apology with a hand. “If there is any moment to curse, it is surely now.” She looks around. “I have to get to the Godswood.”

Bran.

Her heart is suddenly racing as she gathers her skirts and makes her way through the yard as quickly as she can, while trying not to step on any of the dead. The further she gets away from the crypt, the worse the sight of the dead gets. Eventually there is no more ground she can step on, and Sansa almost stumbles as she recognizes many of the men of Winterfell lying in the dead. She also spots Tormund and Podrick combing through the dead, and in the dawn light there are shouts of people calling out in agony.

Gods. What a sight.

Sansa ignores it all, until she passes the gate into the Godswood, where even more dead gather. She pushes her way through until she sees Bran, sitting in his rolling chair, hale and healthy. The relief almost fells her, and she runs the last few steps towards her brother.

“Bran,” she exclaims, falling to her knees before him. “Gods, Bran.”

“Sansa,” he says, in the same measured and quiet voice he always speaks in and Sansa, to her utmost embarrassment, starts weeping. She buries her head in her hands, weeping in abandonment.

The war is over. They won.

She doesn’t know how long she weeps at Bran’s feet, but there is a soft touch to her shoulder eventually and she looks up. “Oh,” she exclaims, rising to her feet and throwing herself at Arya, who looks dreadful. She looks injured, dark marks around her neck and with a headwound. “Oh, Arya.” Sansa whispers, kissing Arya on the forehead, her hair and cheeks until she feels like she can stop shaking.

It is a testament to what they just went through that Arya does not even protest, just clinging to Sansa, her hands entangled tightly in the folds of Sansa’s furs. Arya is shaking, and as the thundering in Sansa’s ears stop, she can hear her sister sobbing heavily. Sansa has never seen Arya cry before.

“Arya killed the Night King,” Bran’s measured voice says.

What? “WHAT?”

Sansa pulls away to look at Arya, incredulously, but Arya just nods. She is still crying, and she doesn’t let go of Sansa’s arms. She suddenly looks like her age, not like the woman that had survived everything after Fathers death, but like the girl she is. She looks scared and exhausted and Sansa is so, so, so proud of her. “I am so proud of you,” Sansa says, kissing Arya on the forehead again. “But Gods, Arya, what were you thinking?”

Arya laughs. It sounds a little hysterical. “I wasn’t,” she confesses.

“Arya had the element of surprise,” Bran says. “The Night King didn’t know about her, didn’t know what she could do.”

“I was no one,” Arya breathes, quietly.

They all look up as shouts of Bran’s name fill the air and there is only a moment before Jon comes running through the trees. Suddenly, all that has happened, all the death, comes rushing back for Sansa and she doesn’t want to leave the Godswood, where her family is safe and sound for now. Jon looks horrible, dirty and grimy and injured on his side. He stops short of all three of them and his face crumples.

Arya leaps at him and they crash to the floor, Jon too exhausted or maybe too weak to hold Arya upright. Sansa steps back, placing her hand on Bran’s shoulder and they watch as Jon and Arya hold each other. The world blurs, before Sansa blinks away the tears and her hold on Bran must hurt, but he doesn’t say a word.

Jon and Arya do untangle eventually. Both are wiping at their eyes and Sansa smiles at the sight. Jon turns his attentions towards them then. He sinks to his knees before Bran and takes both of Bran’s hands into his and kisses them. “Gods, I was so afraid you would die,” Jon says softly.

Bran inclines his head at Jon. “I nearly did,” he says. “We nearly lost.”

The words should not be a surprise, but they twist Sansa’s stomach nevertheless. By the looks on Jon and Arya’s faces they feel similar. Jon looks up at Sansa and she tries to summon a smile for him, but in the end her smile feels as shaky as she does.

“Sansa. Were the crypts safe?” Jon asks, quietly.

Sansa shakes her head. Jon’s face falls and she agrees. “Most survived,” she tells him. “But we should have thought of the fact that we bury our dead in the crypt.”

Jon frowns. “They are long dead.”

“It didn’t matter,” Sansa says. She shakes her head. “It doesn’t matter. The war is won.”

Jon nods. “And we survived.”

Sansa smiles. They did. She had not lost any one of her family. Thousands of their men had died, and Winterfell was drenched in blood and rubble, but Sansa, Arya, Bran and Jon, they were all fine. It is all that Sansa can care about in that moment, whether that makes her a horrible person or not, she does not really care.


End file.
